D&D 5E Which was the most recent Wizards adventure you consider a classic?

Caveman said:

Dungeon of the Mad Mage disappointed me. None of the charm of the og product. It highlighted how 5e isn't that conducive to big dungeon play. There's a dozen megadungeons I'd run before Mad Mage.

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I never ran Mad Mage. I looked at it and it didn't appeal. I think you can run enjoyable megadungeons using 5E rules (in fact, I hope I do!) but this isn't really structured as a megadungeon - at least, not the type of megadungeon I'll enjoy running a campaign in!

Caveman said:

I played ToA as a player. The final dungeon and the canyon around it was cool but the jungle hexcrawl part was whatever. Every thing since has seemed terrible. Modules written by committee. Ridiculous.

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Yeah, Omu and the Tomb are what I like as well. The jungle hexcrawl I think is pretty terrible - but I have a lot of friends (experienced, published designers as well!) who have a great time with it. It's hard knowing how much gets fixed by the DM!

Cheers!

MerricB said:

Yes. Having a team of writers isn't a bad thing - but it requires good leadership and co-ordination, something that isn't always present.

It's worth noting how few big adventures have been published over the lifetime of D&D. The current era is notable for the number of such. (And likewise, the Paizo era of Adventure Paths... which are not written by single authors).

Look at TV series - how many of those are written by a single writer compared to a team? We can find good and bad examples of both!

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Babylon 5 had about 50% of its first two seasons and almost all of its last three (with the exception of one episode written by Neil Gaiman) written by one person, and it's pretty amazing.

That said, a tv show is significantly larger in scope than most adventures/adventure paths. I'd say most Big Adventures are somewhere between a mini-season (e.g. the 6 episodes of She-Hulk or most other MCU shows) and a modern-day full season (which is usually something like 13 episodes, sad to say).

MerricB said:

I never ran Mad Mage. I looked at it and it didn't appeal. I think you can run enjoyable megadungeons using 5E rules (in fact, I hope I do!) but this isn't really structured as a megadungeon - at least, not the type of megadungeon I'll enjoy running a campaign in!

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I had fun with Mad Mage because it was just what my group needed after the COVID chaos - an old school beer-and-pretzels campaign where the PCs kick in the door, kill the monsters, and take their stuff – with the twist that there’s an all-powerful DM stand-in NPC complicating matters. The plot was what my players made of it.

MerricB said:

Yeah, Omu and the Tomb are what I like as well. The jungle hexcrawl I think is pretty terrible - but I have a lot of friends (experienced, published designers as well!) who have a great time with it. It's hard knowing how much gets fixed by the DM!

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I had a much better time with the jungle hexcrawl the second time, when I made that the focus of the early levels and only introduced the death curse when the PCs were ready to go to Omu. The first time it was indeed a bit rushed and not as fun.

MerricB said:

Tomb of Annihilation I primarily love for Omu. I think Omu and the Tomb itself is where it's working brilliantly. The prologue (all that mucking around in the jungle) has a lot of "we trust the DM to make it work" energy.

And I've known a lot of DMs who take the bare outline and do amazing stuff with it.

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We had so much fun with all the stuff in the jungle prior to finding and entering the tomb. I have no idea how much stuff was added by our DM vs what was as written, but I loved it all.

The final fight with Acerarak felt a bit powergamey and weird, but the Omu stuff was awesome.

Olaf the Stout said:

We had so much fun with all the stuff in the jungle prior to finding and entering the tomb. I have no idea how much stuff was added by our DM vs what was as written, but I loved it all.

The final fight with Acerarak felt a bit powergamey and weird, but the Omu stuff was awesome.

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It requires quite a bit of DN skill to “sell” a hexcrawl and make it engaging, rather than just a series of random rolls. I say this as a DM who has never managed to master that skill.

Paul Farquhar said:

It requires quite a bit of DN skill to “sell” a hexcrawl and make it engaging, rather than just a series of random rolls. I say this as a DM who has never managed to master that skill.

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I'll acknowledge that I don't think I ran it as a "real" hexcrawl where the PCs were just randomly exploring the jungle. Each time they ventured into the wilds, they had a quest with a specific destination. Often they had a guide who knew where that destination was (or its approximate location at least).